Genetic sequencing of severe mental illnesses in diverse populations
Official title: 3/3 Sequencing and Trans-Diagnostic Phenotyping of Severe Mental Illness in Diverse Populations
Funded at Cardiff University · NIH-11125799 · Data updated 2026-11-12
This project will use large-scale genetic sequencing to find DNA changes linked to severe psychiatric conditions like schizophrenia, bipolar I, and serious depression in people from many regions.
Quick facts
| Grant type | R01 grant |
|---|---|
| Study type | NIH-funded research |
| Funding institution | Cardiff University NIH-funded |
| Lab location | 1 site (Cardiff, United Kingdom) |
| Project start | September 1, 2022 |
| Project end | June 30, 2028 |
| Funding year | 2025 |
| Award (this year) | $522,882 |
| NIH project number | 5R01MH130672-03 |
| Project ID | NIH-11125799 on NIH RePORTER |
Who could benefit from this research
✓Could help
Ideal participants are people with lifetime diagnoses of schizophrenia, schizoaffective disorder, bipolar I disorder, or severe major depressive disorder who can provide consent and a DNA sample.
✕Less likely to help
People without these diagnoses would not be eligible and may not see direct benefits, and immediate clinical benefit is unlikely because genetic findings usually take time to translate into treatments.
What this research studies
You could take part in a global effort to sequence the protein-coding parts of the genome (whole-exome) and run genetic arrays on more than 150,000 people with severe psychiatric disorders alongside a similar number of controls. Clinical samples and information will be collected at collaborating sites across the Americas, Europe, Africa, and Asia, and a partner genomics center will perform the lab assays. Researchers will search for very rare exonic changes, copy-number differences, and common variants that may contribute to illness across diagnoses such as schizophrenia, schizoaffective disorder, bipolar I, and severe major depression. The project starts by using existing samples and then adds newly collected samples to reach its targets.
Why it matters
Potential benefit: If successful, the work could point to biological causes of severe mental illnesses that over time lead to better diagnosis, new treatments, or clearer genetic risk information.
How similar studies have gone: Past large psychiatric genomics projects have found common risk variants, but this much larger, exome-focused and transdiagnostic sequencing effort is relatively novel and aims to find rarer, higher-impact variants.
Where this research is happening
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Cardiff University
Cardiff, United Kingdom Active
Researchers
- Principal investigator: Walters, James Tynan Rhys — Cardiff University
- Study coordinator: Walters, James Tynan Rhys
About this research
- This is an active NIH-funded research project — typically early-stage science, not a clinical trial accepting patient enrollment.
- Some NIH-funded labs run parallel clinical studies or seek volunteers for related work. To check, contact the principal investigator or institution listed above.
- For full project details, budget, and progress reports, visit the official NIH RePORTER page.